


Planet Child

by cone



Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 13:39:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4437605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cone/pseuds/cone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why do we want to explore the universe?</p><p>There are practical reasons.</p><p>To search for resources,</p><p>To expand our knowledge.</p><p>There are personal reasons.</p><p>To run away from home,</p><p>In search of a home.</p><p>And sometimes, there aren't any reasons.</p><p>Mine... I'd rather not talk about.</p><p>I've never really thought of this as my story.</p><p>Just the universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Planet Child

"Still, to think Theta would crash land on a UDP. What a mess, haha."

"You didn't interfere with the natives, did you?"

"Hahaha, not that we care!"

\-- 15 hours ago --

"Log. Crash landed on some planet. I'm not sure which."

[Underdeveloped Planet EGC 0x0 0x6E800 b]

"Thank you, Navi. Anyways... Haah... I wonder about it sometimes... Maybe I should've just stayed on Earth and... worked in an office or something, I don't know... 'Gotten a real job,' as the folks liked to say. It's just always... it's always things like this. I always seem to want to fly the most when I'm grounded. To the point where I wonder..." 

A muffled rustling in the vegetation catches my wandering train of thought.

"Ah. A native... no, an indigenous person saw me. End log."

I think... that's a bit of a problem.

"Navi, can you put on camouflage or something?"

[Camouflage is already active on the ship.]

"Oh."

I guess that's my fault for getting out then.

We're not supposed to interfere with underdeveloped planets.

Something about letting them develop to space-faring levels free of outside influence.

I wonder if that's lonesome to them, thinking you might be the only life in the universe...

Or maybe that's more of a secular thing, thinking there's nothing out there if there's no proof that it's out there.

That's probably why they don't want us to interfere.

There are too many different ways to think about things.

"Navi, can you pull up a map of the area?"

[Interaction with indigenous peoples is prohibited.]

"Navi, deactivate emergency mode."

[About time.]

"I just wanna take a look with my binoculars or something."

[I'd just get back inside if I were you. It looked to me like people were moving in our direction.]

"Eh? Doesn't that sound dangerous?"

[Probably not more dangerous than space.]

"Come on, isn't there anything I can do?"

[The beacon's lit; all we have to do is wait. Get some sleep.]

Sleep, huh...

The last time I slept on the ground...

\---

"When I grow up, I want to visit the Pleiades!"

"And why do you want to visit the Pleiades, dear?"

"I don't know!"

"Haha, oh, _____."

Mom?

"What is this?"

That's my pilot's license. "Why do you-"

"Were you planning on running away without telling us?"

"No! I wasn't-"

"_____, you're not a child anymore. You can't just blindly wander around like this."

"But I want to be a space pilot..."

"And why do you want to be a space pilot?"

"That's... Why are you so against this?"

"We're just trying to help you make the right decision, _____. I think you know, too, that you don't have a good reason for this."

"I... I-"

"I think, deep down, you know you're making a m-"

\---

"I just want...!"

That dream... never gives me a chance to respond.

Though, if I could, it would be historical revisionism.

Children are like underdeveloped planets, aren't they?

We want to protect them, but we also want them to learn for themselves.

Well, I guess normally that comparison would be the other way around.

"Navi, did anything happen while I was asleep?"

[A Doublefin-class ship responded to our distress signal. They should be here in about 6 hours.]

"What about on the ground?"

[No report. You get really antsy while grounded, don't you?]

"Eh? How do you..."

[You tossed around a lot more than usual.]

"Haah... yeah... it's just... being grounded feels like being locked in a cage, waiting for the planet to have its way with you. The whole reason I started flying was because I was tired of waiting to be rescued. So I threw away everything on that chance, and now..."

My eyes begin watering, so I shut them.

"Now I'm thinking... maybe it wasn't such a good decision..."

Crash landing and getting stranded on a foreign planet, maybe even losing my life.

They're all things that I knew could have happened, but I just didn't want to think about them at the time.

Maybe... this really was...

[It was all you could do, right?]

I nod to hide my trembling voice.

'A mistake.'

[Then, can you really call that a decision?] 

"Eh?"

[Between doing nothing and dying versus doing something, for a nav AI, that isn't a choice. And I don't think you'd be a good space pilot if you saw it as a choice, either.]

"But I... I thought about it a lot then... dying..."

[And do you still think about it now?]

"Eh...?" ... I see... haven't thought about it in a while, have I?

[If not, then, as silly as it is to say, space is a safer place for you than where you were before.]

"Hehe. Thank you, Navi."

[Heh. I'm your Navigator, after all. Through space and life.]

\-- Present time --

"The Navis are saying everything is ready."

"We're ready whenever over here."

"Alright, Navi. Take us into space."

[Yes, Ma'am!]

As we lift off, I can feel my spirits rising with us.

Lush crimson vegetation gives way to milky teal oceans, and the horizon begins to bow.

Soon, the planet is just a red and green drop in the cosmic sea.

Planets are so big.

But space is even larger.

\---

Extra: Navis

[Navi-DF-00977X.]

[Navi-MT-20291P.]

[Docking?]

[Docking.]

[Active.]

[Passive.]

[Give.]

[Receive.]

[Lock.]

[Lock.]

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. 
> 
> Inspired loosely by No Man's Sky, and possibly Diebuster.
> 
> Alternate title: Place-Life Continuum


End file.
